MIDDLETOWN, Rhode Island USA — "Five! Four! Three! Two! One!"

Successful liftoff? Err, not this time.

Wolfgang Heller, a senior, tries to retrieve his rocket from a tree outside Middletown High School. Photo: David Hansen.

"What went wrong?" Middletown High School science teacher Susan Cunningham asked, wondering why the foot-long sputtering model rocket failed to break free from gravity's pull for a few moments and jet into the sky before drifting back to Earth.

"Has to be the fuse," a student in her space science class replied during an exercise held in the field in front of the school on Valley Road.

"That pad hasn't worked right all day," another student added. "We'll get it."

Lesson No. 1 of model rocketing, according to Cunningham: There's a lot more to getting those little dynamos off the ground than it might appear.

Not only does the rocket have to be properly packed, the wiring needs to be right, the switches aligned and, the top priority, everyone has to be safe.

"Each one of these is a learning experience, whether it goes right away or takes six tries," Cunningham said. "We'll go back and figure out how high they went into the sky and where things went wrong."

Space science is a half-year course at Middletown High and open to all students, regardless of grade level, just like the geology, meteorology and oceanography courses. Students regularly visit Krupowicz Planetarium at Gaudet Middle School to get an unobstructed view of the night sky, Cunningham said.

The model-rocket exercise, where students are for responsible for designing, painting, preparing and launching their rocket, are among the hands-on experiences the curriculum features.

"We have to figure out all sorts of things," junior Ferrin Gilchrest said after retrieving her red-and-white-tipped rocket. "The velocity of the rocket, how high it went. There's a lot that goes into it, but it's a lot of fun."

Freshman Martin Partin signed up for the class because he figured it would be fun to learn about the planets, the sun and objects in the night sky. He said he hasn't been disappointed.

"There's a lot more mathematics and physics than you'd think," Partin said. "We're always doing something cool in this class."

"It's one of the classes I really like," fellow freshman Joey Sanfilippo added, holding his blue-and-red Sizzler model rocket. "It's always something new and interesting."

Senior Dason Kiss always wanted to take space science, but other school obligations got in the way, until this year.

"It's been a great experience, learning so much more about things than I ever knew," Kiss said. "Things like how the tides are impacted by the moon, and more about what's going on in the world around me."

Getting students interested in their world is the point of space science and the other related courses, Cunningham said.

"You never know what you might learn on any given day," she said. "When you read it or hear it, sometimes it sinks in, but when you're actually doing the work yourself, you'll always learn from it. These students will never forget this experience. Most people never get to launch a rocket."

Middletown High Principal Steven S. Ruscito agreed.

"We have always known that students learn differently, some are visual, others auditory, others kinetic, and so on, and we also know that through constructivist learning opportunities students gain their deepest understanding of concepts, themes and content," Ruscito said.

"Assembly and the launch of these rockets allows students the opportunity to apply their understanding of that which was taught and take it to the next level, as they now have the opportunity to take their understanding coupled with their rocket launch observation and reflection to create a new deeper understanding."

Copyright © 2007, Newport Daily News.